Shavua tov! Harry, did you open something special for the end of the world?

Friday night:

The Cave, 2006: A blend of 65% Cabernet Sauvignon, 33% Merlot and 2% Petit Verdot, aged for 24 months in french oak barrels. Garnet in color (חכליל or "chachlil" as now translated by the newly released glossary of Hebrew Wine Terms...), with on the nose ripe, almost jammy cherries, raspberries and tobacco. Full-bodied with on the palate again ripe cherries, raspberries, blackberries with a hint of tar, cherry liquor and sweet tobacco on the moderately long finish with very soft, integrated tannins. The wine is clearly at its peak thus I wouldn't hold any leftover bottles for too long. Until the 2008 vintage that is absolutely delicious, well-extracted, layered and refined, The Cave wines never really impressed me and this one makes no exception. Reminded me of the Binyamina Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve of the same vintage (06) that was 60% cheaper...

Recanati, Petite Sirah-Zinfandel Reserve 2009: A fruit bomb . A blend of 90% Petite-Sirah and 10% Zinfandel, aged 8 months in american oak barrels. Dark, impenetrable purple with a beautiful, heavily perfumed nose of ripe blueberries, spicy wood, lavender and plums. Full-bodied with on the palate ripe blueberries (more like sweetened super ripe billberries), boysenberries and dark plums with spicy wood and peppermint rising with almost mouth-coating tannins on the long finish. Yum.

Shabbat lunch:

Gat Shomron, Shiraz 2008: From vineyards located in both Shiloh (Shomron) and the Upper Galilee, aged for 32 months in french oak barrels. Curiously (ok, not really), this wine does not carry "Reserve" on the label whereas the following wine which spent "only" 8 months in the barrels does... First of all Thank G-d! this was not an oak bomb. Dark garnet towards purple, with on the nose black plums, raspberries and leather with some spicy wood. Full-bodied with on the palate plums, ripe blackberries, raspberries, tar, earthy minerals, spicy cedar wood and with an appealing note of juicy green olives with nice tannins showing along on the long finish. Not bad at all.

Gat Shomron, Carignan Reserve 2009: Made from old vines Carignan grapes from a Judean Hills vineyard and aged for 8 months in french oak barrels. Very dark garnet towards purple with on the nose blackberries, raspberries and wild mushrooms as well as black pepper, pretty much of the same showing on the somewhat dusty medium to full-bodied palate along with allspice, licorice black pepper and fresh coffee with bold, almost chewy tannins showing on the long and mouth-filling finish. Very nice.

Gat Shomron (yes, again...), Gatot 2008, "delicately sweetened" dessert wine: A very uncommon animal. A sweetened Bordeaux-blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Petit Verdot to which sugar was added after the fermentation was stopped. A dark ruby towards garnet wine with on the nose dark cherries, milk chocolate, hot caramelized nuts and plums. This a medium to full-bodied wine with on the palate much of the same as on the nose with a moderate not-cloying sweetness, juicy raspberries and caramelized almonds giving lightly bitter feel on the mid-palate followed by milk chocolate-covered cherries (with liquor) as well as almost searing tannins on the almost endless finish. Lovely, I intend on sipping a bit of this wine for a few weeks to see how it develops.

Tzora Shoresh Blanc 2009 - Quite surprisingly, I liked the wine much better than at any previous tasting, and I've tasted plenty. Gone was the unwelcome bitterness, and in its place were nice honeyed apricot and lychee flavors. I was about to give up on dry Gewürztraminer, ready to declare that in my opinion Gewürztraminer is best when made off-dry, when this wine transforms itself and my opinion. To be sure, Ya'akov Oriah from Midbar winery has also decided to produce his Gewurztraminer based blend in an off-dry style as a means to overcome the grapes deficiencies on the palate, so that my thoughts on the grape are shared by the Israeli winemaker most devoted to white wines. In this case, having more patience would have rewarded me. 13.5% AbV and about 90 NIS from the winery upon release. B/**

Flam Classico 2010 - This is a Bordeaux blend, with Merlot as the primary component (50%), followed by Cabernet Sauvignon (42%), and rounded out with Malbec (5%) and Petit Verdot (3%). The fruit is melange of ripe plum and cherry, coupled with herbs and warm spices, with an nice twist of licorice on the finish. Its well balanced and continues to be a very pleasant accompaniment to a meal. 14% AbV and about 80 NIS directly from the winery. B/**

Finally got the 2006 Yarden tel Phares Syrah to sing after two straight flops. And it was singing beautifully.We also enjoyed the newly released 2009 Hevron Heights Isaac's Ram. The same earthy chocolate notes that is present in the 2007 vintage.

Adam M wrote:Finally got the 2006 Yarden tel Phares Syrah to sing after two straight flops. And it was singing beautifully.We also enjoyed the newly released 2009 Hevron Heights Isaac's Ram. The same earthy chocolate notes that is present in the 2007 vintage.

Hi; friday night opened the binyamina yogev cab/petit verdot 2010 which I recall was praised on the forum here. Personaly found it dissapointing in all categories. Just drinkable. By day opened the terrenal malbec 2012 which I purchased 5 btls of just based on 0david Racah. Started off with a surprise as there was a strong funkiness in the wine that I would not have expected from so young a wine. It calmed down after awhile. Will revisit this one at a future date. H

Hi Gabriel - now that is straining my memory slightly out of my comfort zone (especially considering I'm recently home from the neighborhood pub where for the past 3 hours I watched my football team perish in overtime in a critical end of season game). At a high level, I would say that the wine stays true to its earthy quality but at this point in its life is showing more prominent chocolate notes than I recall the 2005 vintage. It's more along the lines of the 2007 in this regard. Whatever,the 09 is very enjoyable. I would recommend that you make a visit to Eli Bashan's at the shuk and ask them for a blue cheese that is similar to the non-kosher (but vegan) Stilton blue cheese from England. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised at how nicely this particular wine pairs.

Dalton Cabernet Reserve 2009 - very enjoyable, full bodied, the mouth showing strong notes of plum and finishing off with a hint of chocolate. I opened it a few hours before the meal but it was still a little tight, a few minutes of resting and swirling in the glass really opened it up. Shabbos day, a few shots of Balvenie 15 by kiddush and for the meal, an extremely rare and special beer - arguably the most coveted and best beer in the world - Westvleteren 12 - it was phenomenal! (Though I do feel there are other easily attainable beers that are similar)

Still reeling at the horse carcasses and road kill nuances. And that horse must have been a lilliputian zombie to be doing the backstroke. Honestly, I can't understand the references. Bloody, red meat is one thing, nice in small concentrations, but carcasses and road kill bring to mind intestinal contents spilled all over the place, not the prettiest picture.

Craig Winchell wrote:Still reeling at the horse carcasses and road kill nuances. And that horse must have been a lilliputian zombie to be doing the backstroke. Honestly, I can't understand the references. Bloody, red meat is one thing, nice in small concentrations, but carcasses and road kill bring to mind intestinal contents spilled all over the place, not the prettiest picture.

Dude - carcass because the it smelled like heaps of smoked animal, roasted meat, bacon, or whatever version of the metaphor you wish. Personally, to me it was more ripe and smoked and less bacon, hence the backstroke. Sorry if it dos not work for you - I liked it.

Adam M wrote:Hi Gabriel - now that is straining my memory slightly out of my comfort zone (especially considering I'm recently home from the neighborhood pub where for the past 3 hours I watched my football team perish in overtime in a critical end of season game). At a high level, I would say that the wine stays true to its earthy quality but at this point in its life is showing more prominent chocolate notes than I recall the 2005 vintage. It's more along the lines of the 2007 in this regard. Whatever,the 09 is very enjoyable. I would recommend that you make a visit to Eli Bashan's at the shuk and ask them for a blue cheese that is similar to the non-kosher (but vegan) Stilton blue cheese from England. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised at how nicely this particular wine pairs.

Sorry for your football team... sounds quite interesting indeed and I will try and consider applying your cheese pairing suggestion at the earliest opportunity! BTW, I did an horizontal tasting of 3 Israeli Port-style wines today. Guess which one was the winner? (hint: you love it!)

I will soon post my own TN of the Nevel, I'm just getting a bit lazy as I've visited many wineries over the past few weeks and took countless notes, some of which not on my iphone as opposed to what I usually do so I can't copy-paste them and will have to type them all.

Surprised no one commented on the new Saslove wines. I hope we will see the rest of the Saslove reserve wines in NYC at the Gotham event. Anyone know who Chai Importers are? Looked through the TTB images - there are many coming to the USA, all the Adom and non-adom wines.